a tenacious Marc Marquez He won on Sunday against the also Spanish Jorge Martinchampionship leader, in a titanic battle for the Australian MotoGP, while Francesco Bagnaia was relegated to third place.
Márquez, a Gresini rider, had a horrible start but recovered until he chased Martín, from Pramac, and overtook him with four laps remaining to achieve his fourth victory at Phillip Island.
Although Márquez won on Sunday, Martín extended his advantage over the current champion, the Italian Bagnaia, of Ducati, to 20 points in the dispute for the title with three weekend tests pending. Ducati-VR46’s Fabio Di Giannantonio finished fourth ahead of Bagnaia’s teammate Enea Bastiniani and Pramac’s Franco Morbidelli.
The championship is practically a duel between Martín and Bagnaia, but Márquez’s victory kept him with options in the dispute. But with 79 points down, it will be difficult for them to sneak into the title race.
The circuit passes next weekend to Thailand, before going to Malaysia and the season finale in Valencia. On a sunny and windy afternoon at the coastal circuit, Martín maintained his lead into the first corner and put the pedal to the metal.
Marquez skidded hard when the lights went out and fell from second to seventh place, while Bagnaia went from fourth to second place. After three laps, Martín had a lead of 0.7 seconds over the Italian.
But Márquez focused and began putting in faster laps, including his first in under 1m 28seconds in race conditions at the coastal circuit. Thus he again caught up with Bagnaia, who was hunting Martín. Márquez made his move against the Italian on lap 12 of the 27 laps of the race to take second place.
With four laps to go, Márquez took the lead for the first time in the test. Martín took it from him on the next lap, but Márquez recovered it almost immediately, to achieve his third victory of the season.
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